Review
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2015. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Hepatol. Dec 18, 2015; 7(29): 2896-2905
Published online Dec 18, 2015. doi: 10.4254/wjh.v7.i29.2896
Recurrence of autoimmune liver diseases after liver transplantation
Nabiha Faisal, Eberhard L Renner
Nabiha Faisal, Eberhard L Renner, Liver Transplant Program/Multiorgan Transplant Program, University Health Network/Toronto General Hospital, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5G 2N2, Canada
Author contributions: Both authors contributed equally regarding conception and design of this review; Faisal N searched and reviewed the literature, and drafted the manuscript; Renner EL reviewed the literature, and revised the manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: None of the authors has a conflict of interest with regards to this review.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Eberhard L Renner, MD, FRCP(C), Professor of Medicine, Director GI Transplantation, Liver Transplant Program/Multiorgan Transplant Program, University Health Network/Toronto General Hospital, University of Toronto, 585 University Avenue, 11 PMB 176, Toronto, ON M5G 2N2, Canada. eberhard.renner@uhn.ca
Telephone: +1-416-3405221 Fax: +1-416-3403126
Received: July 14, 2015
Peer-review started: July 22, 2015
First decision: August 25, 2015
Revised: November 7, 2015
Accepted: December 1, 2015
Article in press: December 2, 2015
Published online: December 18, 2015
Core Tip

Core tip: There is compelling evidence that autoimmune liver disease recur after liver transplantation, with incidence rates ranging from 10% to 50%. Recurrent autoimmune hepatitis and primary biliary cirrhosis do rarely impair patient and graft survival, but may require changing the immunosuppressive regimen, using corticosteroids or adding ursodeoxycholic acid, respectively. In a proportion of patients, recurrent primary sclerosing cholangitis progresses over years to a stage requiring re-transplantation.